People watch a TV screen showing a news program about North Korea’s reported launch of a hypersonic missile, Seoul, South Korea, Sept. 29, 2021 (AP photo by Lee Jin-man).

In July, an obscure but important body called the China Academy of Launch Vehicle Technology announced the 77th launch of the Long March 2C orbital launch vehicle, a workhorse of China’s ballistic missile and space programs. Then, in late August, a little more than a month later, the academy announced the Long March’s 79th launch. At a minimum, for the specialists who monitor such things, the omission of a 78th launch seemed to portend something odd and potentially momentous. Now, nearly two months later, following a scoop by the Financial Times, the world found out that China has begun testing a […]

Followers of Shiite cleric Moqtada al-Sadr celebrate after the announcement of the results of parliamentary elections, Baghdad, Iraq, Oct. 11, 2021 (AP photo by Khalid Mohammed).

On Sunday, for the fifth time since the U.S. invasion that ousted Saddam Hussein in 2003, Iraqis voted in elections. Initial results suggest that the big winner was nationalist cleric Muqtada al-Sadr, whose political formation once again emerged with the most seats in parliament. Parties aligned with pro-Iranian militias were the big losers, seeing their vote totals plummet. But with turnout at a record low 41 percent of registered voters, the election is being seen as an expression of Iraqis’ disillusionment with the state of the country’s electoral politics. The elections were the culmination of a political process triggered by […]

Japanese Prime Minister Kishida Fumio at a news conference in Tokyo, Oct. 14, 2021 (pool photo by Eugene Hoshiko via AP).

In 1997, a group of lawmakers from the youth division of Japan’s long-ruling Liberal Democratic Party paid a visit to Taiwan. The evening reception got boozy, as the hosts repeatedly raised their cups and called upon their guests to join them in draining the contents in one gulp, accompanied by the customary toast of kan pei, which literally means “dry glass.” The head of the LDP delegation was none other than Abe Shinzo, who had just been elected to Japan’s legislature, the Diet, four years earlier and would go on to become the country’s longest-serving prime minister. Abe is known to imbibe […]